Last Friday, an exclusive report from Reuters noted that the SoftBank Group in Japan is financially prepared to give up control of recently acquired Sprint and hand over the keys to Deutsche Telekom AG’s brand in America, also known as T-Mobile USA.

The wireless merger of the century appears to be more than just speculation. While details remain scanty, the FCC is currently holding a 600MHz spectrum auction until April, and so has imposed some strict anti-collusion rules that prevent acquisition discussions between rivals until the airwave auctions end.

SoftBank, which originally purchased Sprint in July 2013, had begun talks with T-Mobile the following summer to pay $40 per share to gain controlling stake in the company, along with a $2 billion breakup fee if the deal collapsed. A month later, the deal fell through after SoftBank and Sprint conceded that they didn’t believe US antitrust regulators would be persuaded to sign off on a merger between the third and fourth largest wireless providers in the country.

In July 2014, T-Mobile was valued at $30 billion, but its market value rose to $50 billion in late 2016 as it grew to 71.5 million subscribers. While Sprint has not quite caught up to T-Mobile’s pace in wireless subscriber growth, its latest earnings report indicates a net gain of 368,000 postpaid subscribers last quarter and a market valuation around $36 billion. The number three wireless carrier now largely outpaces AT&T and Verizon, even as it struggles to manage the $479 million net loss it incurred during this timeframe.

SoftBank wants to retain a minority stake in T-Mobile merger

With the US market being largely dominated by AT&T and Verizon for the past year - 33 percent and 35 percent respectively, SoftBank has expressed frustration with its inability to plant a significant stake in the US market by itself. The Japanese giant is now willing to cede control of its Sprint assets to T-Mobile and retain only a minority stake in the company if the merger is ever approved by regulators.

Deutsche Telekom, on the other hand, has considered the idea but has not quite warmed up to the idea of selling off its US brand. The company currently owns a 65 percent stake in T-Mobile, though in recent months CEO Tim Hoettges told a group of investors that “[The company] is not in the mood of: ‘Oh where is the partner we need?” He then explained the challenges in facing an onslaught of new variables in the regulatory environment as the US administrations has promoted job creation. According to Christopher Marangi, co-chief investment officer at GAMCO Investors, a merger of this scale is more indicative of many job cuts in the US.

With several antitrust positions expected to be replaced at the US Department of Justice, there is also some difficulty in gauging how such deals will be viewed. On the FCC side, former chairman Tom Wheeler remained highly skeptical of first merger proposal in 2014, while the chairman Ajit Pai has been characterized as more friendly to industry consolidation.

Some former policy directors, including David Balto from the FTC, have claimed that Sprint and T-Mobile may try to sell their merger by proposing that a bigger “Number 3” in the US wireless market would be able to take advantage of economies of scale and bring a quicker pace of innovation to the market.

Once the FCC auction ends in April, the two parties are expected to begin negotiations, according to sources familiar with the matter.

The HTC One is already available in the USA, or to be precise Amazon.com, for as low as US $799.97 plus shipping.

Amazon.com is currently listing the unlocked HTC One at various prices ranging from US $799.97 all the way up to US $1,179.99, depending on the seller. The lowest priced, US $799.97 plus US $4.49 for shipping, can actually be ordered right now and that seller promises to deliver it in one to two days time.

As you already know, AT&T and Sprint will also have the HTC One 32GB and both want US $199.99 plus contract for it. Both carriers claim that it will start to ship out on April 19th. T-Mobile USA will also ship the HTC One on April 19 and wants US $99.99 on a US $20 per month two year contract.

Of course, we are not talking about the HTC One 64GB Developer Edition that will cost US $649 and should also be available on April 19th. Obviously, the HTC One 64GB is a better choice as it actually ends up cheaper than what Amazon sellers want for an unlocked HTC One 32GB.

Japanese telco SoftBank has confirmed the acquisition of Sprint and it appears that the US telco will set it back about $20.1 billion.

Apparently, both SoftBank and Sprint are ranked third in their own markets and the new company will look to change that. The deal is expected to be done and dusted in 2013, making the new Sprint a force to be reckoned with and have the third largest mobile service in the world.

According to the deal, SoftBank will buy $8 billion worth of new shares and $12.1 billion in existing ones. This will earn it 70 percent stake in Sprint.

Sprint CEO Dan Hesse described the deal as “transformative transaction” for the company. He also said that Sprint’s “management team is excited to work with SoftBank to learn from their successful deployment of LTE in Japan as we build out our advanced LTE network, improve the customer experience and continue the turnaround of our operations.”

While every other mobile hardware journalist around the world is ranting on and on about HTC's new EVO 4G LTE smartphone that will operate on Sprint's new Long-Term Evolution (LTE) network, we decided to pay homage instead to the first device that will actually see the light of day on said network, with consumer availability beginning sometime later this April. After all, the EVO 4G LTE won't be available until sometime towards the end of Q2 2012.

The smartphone in question is the LG Viper, which will officially become Sprint's first 4G LTE device. Sprint announced on Tuesday that pre-orders for the handset will officially begin Thursday, April 12, with the phone becoming available on an unspecified date later this month.

The smartphone will be priced at $99.99 after rebate and with a new 2-year agreement and should be able to take advantage of Sprint’s Everything data plan. The unlimited plan includes unlimited web, texting, and calling over the company's fourth-gen LTE network starting at $79.99 per month.

Apple chum Sprint is in hot water with its shareholders after it revealed how much it is costing to prop up iPhone sales. Shares in the telco fell by 12 percent as the telco said it could need $7 billion in new financing over the next few years to cover a cash shortfall caused by heavy investments in the Apple iPhone introduction and a big network upgrade.

Sprint does not expect to gain anything from its deal with Apple until 2015. Sprint was slammed for refusing to disclose iPhone costs at an October 7 conference. With it losing that much money on the deal it is clear why.

Besides the $7 billion network upgrade plan, Sprint has committed to pay at least $15.5 billion to Apple in the next four years for iPhone, but it expects that amount to be even bigger because it is based on the number of phones it sells. To put this in perspective, the deal with Apple is costing the company more than double its market capitalisation and analysts think that is crazy.

One analyst said that to meet its target it would have to turn its entire company into an Apple shop. Others are saying investors should stay away until they see clear signs Sprint will succeed.

Sprint, which started taking iPhone orders on October 7, is paying Apple a subsidy that is 40 percent higher, or $200 more per device, than what it pays for other phones.

We made a comparison between what you pay for a brand new iPhone 4S on a 2-year contract in the States and what some 8.5 Austrians and other Europeans will have to pay when it launches in some 12+ hours.

We believe that Sprint is among the cheapest carriers in the US and this relative newcomer to iPhone arena can get you this phone for the standard US rate of $199 + $79.99 a month for two years. With this contract you end up paying $2118.76 for an entry level iPhone 4S 16GB, 450 minutes of free talk time a month, unlimited messaging and unlimited data. A 32GB iPhone 4S will set you back only $100 USD more and of course the 64GB version costs $200 more than 16GB version.

AT&T sells the iPhone 4S 16GB for $149.99 with 450 rollover minutes ($39.99) and 2GB of data ($25 a month) , so the iPhone 4S 16GB AT&T edition ends up at $1709.75 for a two-year contract, but if you need more data of text messages it will end up much more expensive than Sprint.

In Austria, thanks to the Drei (3) network, you can get an iPhone 4S 16GB for free, but you will have to pay €45 for 24 months. This amounts to €1080 for the duration of the contract, but for this €45, you get 3,000 minutes to your network, 3,000 minutes call to other Austrian networks, 1,000 SMS messages in all networks as well as unlimited data. They even give you 40 TV and radio channels to watch and listen.

This is Austria’s best offer as usually other networks asks for around €40 a month, two-year contract and still want a €199 one-off payment.

Most other European countries don’t have it this good. For example, German consumers pay way more than Austrians for iPhones or mobile phone contracts in general and this applies to most other EU countries.

To sum it up, Austrians pay roughly half as much as Americans for a new iPhone 4S and they still end up having unlimited data, 6,000 minutes vs. 450 minutes in the US, and 3,000 text messages.

Sprint will be releasing the BlackBerry Bold Touch 9930 (or codename Monza) in the third quarter of this year. The 9930 will be released by Sprint as a global roaming model, meaning that it will be the equivalent of what Verizon calls their Worldphone models.

The 9930 will be the first of the Bold models that will feature both the keyboard that RIM is known for, in conjunction with a touch screen on the unit itself. The unit resembles a Bold 9000 with a touchscreen. At least from what we can see, it is currently running some flavor of the version 6 BlackBerry OS.

No word on how much it will cost with a two-year contract, but we suspect that it is going to cost something more than free.

Those waiting for the RIM BlackBerry PlayBook on Sprint will be happy to know that the Wi-Fi only version will arrive for Sprint starting on June 5th. Of course, the version everyone really wants to know about is the arrival date of the Wi-Max version of the PlayBook; and the answer is that it is still on track for release later this summer.

When the Wi-Fi version of the PlayBook arrives on June 5th at Sprint, it will set you back $499 plus tax. The other PlayBook models that Sprint was expecting are still in the pipeline, but we have no clue when they will arrive beyond stating the obvious, which is that they, too, should arrive at some point this summer.

A number of sources say that Sprint and T-Mobile USA are holding talks about a possible acquisition. Our sources seem to agree that Deutsche Telekom (who owns the number four carrier in the U.S.) is discussing a number of options that could see a variety of things happen to T-Mobile. Sources suggest that Deutsche Telekom and Sprint have been talking on and off for a long time, but nothing has ever come of these talks so far.

It seems that the options Deutsche Telekom is discussing with Sprint could see the company sell all or part of their USA business. Whispers suggest that one of the major stumbling blocks is apparently the actual real value of T-Mobile USA. If Sprint and Deutsche Telekom actually do come to some sort of deal, it is expected that Deutsche Telekom would take a stake in Sprint as part of the transaction.

The most interesting aspect about the deal with Sprint is that T-Mobile USA, as with AT&T, uses GSM technology and is currently committed to LTE for its long-term 4G strategy. Sprint, on the other hand, uses CDMA and WiMAX for its 4G strategy. Sprint also acquired Nextel, which also used technology that was proprietary technology developed by Motorola.

Sprint recently announced that they would be ending support for the iDen technology by moving users off that platform to free up spectrum. A merger of Sprint and T-Mobile USA would give Sprint access to more spectrum that could be used in a number of ways. Analysts that we spoke with suggest that the lack of compatibility between the current platforms is an issue, but it could be solved longer term if Sprint were to adopt LTE going forward which would put both on the same platform.

CES 2011 was a great chance for HTC to launch its 4G phone offer and the company did exactly that by launching three 4G models – HTC EVO Shift 4G from Sprint, HTC Inspire 4G from AT&T and HTC ThunderBolt from Verizon.

HTC EVO Shift 4G is an Android 2.2 phone with a full qwerty keyboard. It comes priced at $149.99 with a two year contract. Note however that this price is after a $100 mail-in rebate.

HTC Inspire 4G for AT&T’s new HSPA+ network comes with a 4.3’’ screen, Dolby and SDS surround sound, active noise cancellation and more. The phone will be the first to use htcsense.com, allowing for tracking a lost or stolen phone, pinpointing its location on the map or just remotely wiping all user data from it. The device shell is carved out of a single piece of aluminum. It is expected in Q1 2011.

HTC ThunderBolt from Verizon comes with a 4.3’’ screen, 8mp camera, DLNA support, embedded Skype connectivity, etc. Pricing and availability will be revealed at a later date. The device is based on Qualcomm’s 1GHz Snapdragon.